Alarm suspend system

1. A monitor having a sensor configured to attach to a person so as to transmit optical radiation into a tissue site and generate a sensor signal responsive to the optical radiation after attenuation by pulsatile blood flow within the tissue site, the monitor configured to measure and display a plurality of physiological parameters responsive to the sensor signal and to generate alarms when those parameter measurements are outside of the predetermined limits, the monitor having an alarm suspend system for silencing the alarms, the alarm suspend system comprising:

an alarm trigger responsive to any of a plurality of parameters and to predetermined limits corresponding to the parameters;

the parameters partitioned into a plurality of fast treatment parameters and a plurality of slow treatment parameters according to the relative length of time it takes for a person to respond to medical treatment for a parameter measurement outside of the predetermined limits;

an audible alarm responsive to the alarm trigger;

an alarm silence button actuated so as to suspend the audible alarm;

a timer for timing the duration of the suspended alarm;

the timer initiated by actuation of the alarm silence button;

the time retriggering the audible alarm after the timed duration has lapsed;

a long duration suspend time associated with the slow treatment parameters; and

a short duration suspend time associated with the fast treatment parameters.

2. The alarm suspend system according to claim 1 wherein:

fast treatment parameters include parameters relating to normal blood hemoglobin constituents; and

slow treatment parameters include parameters related to abnormal blood hemoglobin constituents.

3. The alarm suspend system according to claim 2 wherein:

the short duration suspend time is less than or equal to about two minutes; and

the long duration suspended time is greater than about two minutes.

4. The alarm suspend system according to claim 3 further comprising:

a default duration associated with the fast treatment parameters of about two minutes; and

a default duration associated with the slow treatment parameters of about fifteen minutes.

5. The alarm suspend system according to claim 4 further comprising an alarm suspend override;

the override responsive to a predetermined unit change in a parameter triggering a suspended alarm; and

the override resulting in reactivation of the suspended alarm.

6. The alarm suspend system according to claim 5 further comprising:

a monitor configured to measure the physiological parameters;

a monitor display for displaying the measured parameters;

a pop-up window that appears on the display in response to actuation of the silence button; and

the pop-up window presenting a choice of alarm suspend durations.

7. An alarm suspend method performed by a patient monitoring device, the method comprising:

measuring a plurality of physiological parameters using a patient monitoring device including a processor;

partitioning, the parameters into at least a first group and a second group;

triggering an audible alarm if at least one parameter is outside of predetermined limits;

suspending the audible alarm in response to a silence request;

associating a first duration with the first group and a second duration with the second group;

setting the first duration so as to generally correspond to a first range of treatment times for the first group of parameters;

setting the second duration so as to generally correspond to a second range of treatment times for the second group of parameters;

the first range of treatment times and the second range of treatment times being non-overlapping; and

reactivating the audible alarm after at least one of the first duration and the second duration.

8. The alarm suspend method according to claim 7 comprising the further step of overriding the suspended audible alarm if the triggering parameter has greater than a predetermined unit change before the suspended alarm expires according to the at least one first duration and second duration.

9. The alarm suspend method according to claim 8 comprising the further steps of:

defining the first group in relation to normal hemoglobin measurements; and

defining the second group in relation to abnormal hemoglobin measurements.

10. The alarm suspend method according to claim 9 comprising the further steps of:

setting the first duration to be less than or equal to two minutes; and

setting the second duration to be greater than two minutes.

11. The alarm suspend method according to claim 10 comprising the further steps of:

defining a default duration of about two minutes corresponding to the first group; and

defining a default duration of about fifteen minutes corresponding to the second group.

12. The alarm suspend method according to claim 11 comprising the further steps of:

constructing a pop-up window for a monitor display; and

selecting the first duration and the second duration from a range of durations presented within the pop-up window.

13. A physiological measurement system comprising:

a sensor configured to attach to a person so as to transmit optical radiation into a tissue site and generate a sensor signal responsive to the optical radiation after attenuation by pulsatile blood flow within the tissue site;

a monitor in communication with the sensor so as to measure a plurality of physiological parameters responsive to the sensor signal;

a display mounted on the monitor that displays the measured parameters along with visual alarms associated with the measured parameters;

a speaker mounted on the monitor that generates an audible alarm triggered by at least one of the parameters;

a silence button mounted on the monitor that, when actuated, initiates a silence request for the monitor to suspend the audible alarm;

an alarm suspend system that deactivates the audible alarm for one of a short duration and a long duration according to the alarm-triggering parameter;

a first group of parameters associated with the short duration; and

a second group of parameters associated with the long duration;

the first group and the second group partitioned according to a fast treatment time and a short treatment time associated with the parameters.

14. The physiological measurement system according to claim 13 further comprising an override that reactivates the audible alarm if the trigger parameter changes more than a predetermine amount during the corresponding duration.

15. The physiological measurement system according to claim 14 wherein the first group comprises parameters related to the measurement of normal hemoglobin and the second group comprises parameters related to the measurement of abnormal hemoglobin.

16. The physiological measurement system according to claim 15 wherein the long duration is greater than about 120 seconds.

17. The physiological measurement system according to claim 16 wherein the short duration is less than or equal to about 120 seconds.

18. The physiological measurement system according to claim 17 further comprising a pop-up window for the display that allows selection of the long duration and the short duration in response to the silence button.